Our son started using an iPad at three years old, which may sound incredibly irresponsible but it is not. You’ve got to expose your children to technology at some point…
… but it begs the question, how much is too much? For dads who have kids under the age of 8, it’s rare for kids to be addicted to technology and gaming. Kids that are 10+? I’ve heard it’s an ongoing war to get their kids off consoles, smartphones and everything else.
I’ve got a five-year-old, so I’ve got it pretty easy – for the moment. That will change. What’s a dad supposed to do if his kid starts to fall into bad tech habits?
Hide the power cord.
A mother, whom my wife and I are friends with, shared a good recommendation when my son was still an infant. “When you have an opportunity to blame someone other than yourself, in order to enforce discipline, do it.” She shared an example of blaming the cable operator if their (young) kids were watching too much TV. “The cable company called and said we’re watching too much Nickelodeon. Sorry, no more TV this weekend.”
This was sage advice. So, if you’re son or daughter loves watching YouTube on their iPad, hide the power cord. It will be useless at some point.
Then, tell your kid, “the power cord has gone missing. I don’t know where it could be, oh well. Now go outside and play or build a castle out of Legos.”
Batteries? “We needed to use the rest of them to make sure our smoke detectors worked. Sorry!”
When your kid is addicted to new-age stuff, go old school. That’s the beauty of 21st-century technology; shit stops working, eventually.
The Rookie Father 
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